Politicians are mouthing platitudes over the need to rescue the country from the severe power crunch that it faces, given that alarm bells have been sounded that coal-based thermal power plants are fast running out of fuel. But Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi has characteristically walked the talk. He has dedicated to the nation a solar power plant that has an installed capacity of 605MW, and provided a clean solution to the country’s looming energy crisis that is in sync with ecological sustainability. The solar park at Charanka village in Patan district of Gujarat, 214MW of which is already operational, is the world’s largest photovoltaic plant.

On another occasion, a multi-benefit pilot project generating one megawatt electricity from solar panels atop the Narmada branch canal was also dedicated to the nation by Mr Modi. Besides producing clean energy without causing any pollution, the solar panels would spare an enormous amount of land otherwise required if the solar power project was land-based. In addition, they save a huge quantity of water in the irrigation canals from evaporation.

While inaugurating the solar park on April 19, Mr Modi said that Gandhinagar is being developed as the country’s first model ‘solar city’ with the installation of solar roof-top systems, ranging from one kilowatt to 150KW, at more than 150 locations. The solar park at Charanka, spread over 3,000 acres in the dry, remote region of the State, is the world’s largest solar power park. The plant beats the existing record holder, China’s 200MW Golmud Solar Park. Yet another feather in Gujarat’s power cap is the State Government’s plan to introduce a ‘roof-top solar power policy’ so that the people can generate power for their captive needs and also earn money by selling any surplus to the power grid.

Indeed, Gujarat is the first State in India to achieve the mandatory requirement of energy generated from renewable resources under the Renewable Purchase Obligation of the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission, while providing for 66 per cent of India’s solar capacity.

There are still several thousand villages in India which have virtually zero access to electricity. But the power giants feeding on dirty coal resources have no time for the plight of the people. They have their excuse ready — the deficit of natural resources and poor transport network. But, their plight cannot remain ignored for eternity. Ironically, there are instances of villages that are close to power plants but still are under the curtain of darkness.

A huge electricity deficit is prevailing all over the country with conventional sources of energy miserably failing to meet the minimal power demand. An energy revolution is the need of the day. It can come through the hands of decentralised renewable energy, which is feasible and the most viable solution to the country’s power woes. Solar energy offers a clean, climate-friendly, widely abundant and inexhaustible energy resource to mankind, relatively well-spread over the globe.

A graduated shift from fossil fuels to non-fossil fuels and from reliance on non-renewable and depleting sources of energy to renewable sources is the need of the hour. Gujarat has shown the way, and other States and even the Union Government must emulate the example.

India is a tropical country, where sunshine is available for longer hours per day and in great intensity. Solar energy, therefore, has immense potential as an energy source. It also has the advantage of allowing for the decentralised distribution of energy, thereby empowering people at the grassroots level.

Solar energy has been harnessed by humans since ancient times, using a range of ever-evolving technologies. Solar power is the conversion of sunlight into electricity using photovoltaics or indirectly using concentrated solar power, which use lenses and mirrors and tracking systems to focus a large area of sunlight into a small beam. Photovoltaics convert light into electric current by using the photoelectric effect.

India is endowed with vast solar energy potential, given the radiation map of the country. About 5,000 trillion kWh energy is available over India’s land area, with most parts receiving four to seven kWh per sq metre per day. Hence, both technology routes for conversion of solar radiation into heat and electricity — solar thermal and solar photovoltaics — can effectively be harnessed to offer huge scalability for solar power in India.

The average life-span of any coal-based thermal plant or nuclear power plant is 40 to 50 years. But the coal reserves of the country are fast drying up, with a maximum expected life span of 20 to 30 years. Thus, considering the huge investments that are involved in setting up thermal power plants, the idea will practically yield nothing in the long run, other than damaging the environment. Thermal power plants are the largest carbon emitter and contribute hugely to the carbon footprint of the nation.

Close to 55 per cent of our total power-generating capacity is coal-based, and 85 per cent of coal produced is consumed by power plants. On the other hand, solar energy-based power plants are affordable, clean, green and inexhaustible.

The development of solar energy technologies will have huge long term benefits. It will increase India’s energy security through reliance on an indigenous, inexhaustible and import-independent resource, enhance sustainability, reduce pollution, lower the costs of mitigating climate change and contain fossil fuel prices within manageable limits.

Solar energy scores high on environmental impact as it has zero emissions while generating heat and electricity. Moreover, from an energy security perspective, solar is the most secure of all sources, since it is abundantly available. Interestingly, a small fraction of the total available solar energy can meet the entire country’s power requirements.

Furthermore, the cost of solar energy has dropped faster than anyone had anticipated. Now, this clean energy costs nearly the same as energy from coal and other dirty fossil fuels. And, since, in India no energy source is unsubsidised, even if it is environment-unfriendly, there is no reason why the Government should not provide subsidy on solar power that is eco-friendly.

India is already paying the price of unchecked climate change. If we are going to reduce carbon pollution enough to prevent more devastating floods and extreme heat waves, we will need to work together to leverage solar and every other kind of renewable power to its full potential in the near future. In fact, renewable energy is one of the most powerful weapons we have to fight climate change.

If effective support policies are put in place during the decade, solar energy in its various forms can make considerable contributions to solving some of the most urgent problems the world now faces: Climate change, energy security, and global access to modern energy services.

When ideas are encouraged and implemented, people get motivated, towns get empowered, States grow and the country prospers. This is what Gujarat is doing. It is for the others to see the writing on the wall.